January 2012
3 posts
4 tags
3 tags
Mentor Youth Now
Street gangs, drug addiction, child prostitution, homelessness, abuse and neglect are major concerns for our youth. Homicide is the second leading cause of death for young people ages 10-24. Half of the U.S. youth population (17.6 million kids) is considered “at-risk” of getting into trouble with the law, or “high-risk” and already in trouble.
Our children urgently need help, and mentoring has...
Happy National Mentoring Month!
It’ a new year and like many people, I’m so glad to leave 2011 behind and move into 2012. Yet while the challenges we faced were difficult at times, I look back and marvel at our accomplishment!
We started off the year in our new office downtown, close to the Los Angeles Convention Center, and it’s fabulous — twice the size of our last place and much cheaper with lots of...
October 2011
1 post
19 tags
Arts xChange Links Hutus and Tutsis with Bloods...
I founded my nonprofit organization Create Now in Los Angeles in 1996 after discovering that my city was not only one of the most glamorous places in the world, but we also have the highest poverty rate in the U.S., and more incarcerated youth, homeless children and foster kids than the rest of our country. I had a successful career as a script supervisor (continuity) and a screenwriter in the...
September 2010
1 post
4 tags
Another Meeting with Global Arts Leaders
The International Visitors Council invited me to give another presentation to a group of 20 arts leaders and dignitaries from all over the world, who are guests of our government. They were invited by the U.S. to learn about the arts and tolerance.
This time a representative from the State Department was there and he loved my presentation! Several of the attendees want to collaborate with Create...
June 2010
1 post
4 tags
Middle-Eastern Meeting
Yesterday, I was invited by the International Visitor’s Council (which is funded by the State Department) to give a presentation on Create Now to a group of music educators from the Middle East. They came from Lebanon, Iraq, Algeria, Tunisia, Bahrain, Libya and the Palestinian Territories. They loved my work and there were a lot of handshakes and hugs at the end, along with a gift of a...
April 2010
34 posts
4 tags
Thoughts About Global Xchange
I’ll be digesting and processing my time in South Africa and Northern Ireland for some time to come. I’ve met some remarkable people, made some great new friends, and received a lot of self-knowledge through this phenomenal experience. I’ve grown tremendously and what I’ve learned will be incorporated into my work for Create Now and the community, here and worldwide.
...
4 tags
Last Day and Night in Belfast
After spending another fascinating night at Toni’s, talking into the wee hours, Saturday morning was a beautiful day. We’d been really fortunate during our three weeks in Belfast to have mostly clear weather with seasonally warm temperatures. But the weather here can change in a heartbeat from sunny and bright to pouring rain, and then to hail or even snow, and then right back to...
4 tags
Last Week of Global Xchange
For those of us who didn’t have to be at our WAP on Monday night, we gathered in Belfast Centre and went to Nando’s for dinner at Victoria Square. Nando’s is a popular fast-food type of chain that serves chicken in South Africa, so it was very welcomed by those GX members from Durban who were from there. The Belfast restaurant was warm and attractive. I enjoyed hanging out with...
4 tags
Helen's Cove and Bangor
Kelly picked me up at Toni’s and was very sweet to drop Sbonello off near City Hall. Then we met up with Toni, Chickey, Mary, Jessica, Pumzile, Debbie and her 12 year-old daughter Jessica at Helen’s Cove. It’s a beautiful part of the North Irish coast, bordered by forests. It felt so refreshing to walk and stretch, breathing the salty air.
Afterward, Kelly drove me down...
4 tags
Toni and Chickey's House
Toni Vaughan is one of our GX teammates from Belfast. I grew closer to her during our Belfast phase. She works for Barnardo’s and has been happily married to Chickey for 13 years. He’s an IT tech for the Belfast City Council, and is an absolute sweetheart!
They live in a beautiful big “Craftsman” house built around 1920. It has four rooms and a bathroom upstairs, with a...
4 tags
4 tags
4 tags
4 tags
Forthspring - Part III (Detachment Youth Program)
As youth grow older in this community, they’re less willing to visit the Forthspring center. They prefer to stay on the streets, hanging out at the park or on street corners with friends. The Detachment Youth Program is a unit of Forthspring staff who slowly walk around the streets most nights, in hopes of coming across youth and engaging them in conversation. The purpose is to build trust...
4 tags
Forthspring - Part II (Center-Based)
Forthspring is housed in a Methodist Church, which has around 40 seats in the chapel. They have a big gymnasium, a room with two pool tables and a Foosball game and two separate entrances (in addition to the front door) on the Catholic and Protestant sides. Upstairs are offices and a kitchenette.
While the younger children are from mixed religions, the older youth are separated and attend the...
4 tags
Forthspring - Part I (After-School Kids)
We started our day at 2:00 PM. Around ten kids, ages 4-9 years old, came to the center after being picked up by Forthspring staff at their schools. The program recently lost their funding and now depends on fees paid by local parents.
LOCAL ELEMENTARY SCHOOL
The staff helps the children with their homework, then has a featured activity for the day, such as making chalk drawings or creating...
4 tags
Forthspring
Rafiki and I were assigned to Forthspring for our five-day Work Attachment Plan (WAP). They’re an organization that’s unique for being based in the only community building that straddles an interface in Belfast. These Berlin wall-like interfaces are scattered throughout the city in the most deprived areas. Here are some interface walls in this area.
The two neighborhoods that...
5 tags
4 tags
4 tags
4 tags
4 tags
4 tags
5 tags
4 tags
GX Team Marches in Parade on Belfast Telegraph... →
We’re about a minute into it. I quickly gave up shouting “Hail to the Caterpillar” and “Bow to the Caterpillar” and instead danced and waved to the kids in the crowd. What a blast!!!
4 tags
4 tags
4 tags
4 tags
4 tags
4 tags
4 tags
4 tags
4 tags
4 tags
4 tags
4 tags
4 tags
4 tags
March 2010
55 posts
5 tags
Prepping for the St. Patrick's Day Parade
After leaving the school on Monday, we met up again at the Waterfront, which is a beautiful conference and entertainment center located in the center of town.
Katrina and Martha organized different workshops again: Poetry, Dance/Drumming, Banner Painting and the Caterpillar. This is the one that I joined along with Toni, Anselme, Fernando’s niece Shona and her friends Angelina and...
4 tags
Colasiste Fierste School
Since the GX team decided to make marching in the St. Patrick’s Day Parade our community event, we wanted to involve local youth as much as possible. On Monday, Toni Vaughan arranged for us to go to Colasiste Fierste School, one of the Catholic schools that her organization Barnardo’s serves. The students are ages 11-18 and are taught entirely in the Irish language. We set up different...
4 tags
Moved to Farset International Hostel
As mentioned, I love my host Kelly Colbert, but she lives in Mossley West, which involves a two hour commute to get to the Farset where we hold our meetings, and which is only a five-minute walk to my work placement at Forthspring. Buses here run very sporadically in the evenings and not at all on Sundays. And since Kelly was going to a conference all week and I would be left to fend for myself...
4 tags
4 tags
4 tags
4 tags
4 tags
Our First Week
In addition to our walking tour of Belfast Centre and the bus tour of the city, the GX team got a lot of work done during our first week. After our In-Country Orientation (ICO), we had a visit by Sheina Rigg, a child safety trainer. She went over the laws and best practices of working with children here.
Some of our Belfast partners told us about proper work place etiquette. Eileen Branagh of...
4 tags
Global Xchange Team Meets Lord Mayor of Belfast
The GX group was honored to meet Lord Mayor Naomi Long at City Hall for a wonderful reception on the evening of March 11th. We were served delicious food and wine. The highlight was when we got to meet Lord Mayor Naomi Long (who was just invited to the White House last week by President Obama). I presented her with a Los Angeles T-shirt on behalf of the American team. She told me that she had...
4 tags
